


Medicine

by ourwritinginvein



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Scene, F/M, PTSD, season one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-14
Updated: 2016-06-14
Packaged: 2018-07-15 03:01:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,499
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7203824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ourwritinginvein/pseuds/ourwritinginvein
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oliver goes to QC one day before telling Felicity his secret and forgets to take his PTSD medication, but she somehow seems to calm him down.</p><p>Set: Season 1</p>
            </blockquote>





	Medicine

                                                                      

He forgot. Oliver forgot to take his meds that morning. He needed to talk to Walter though, and he’d busy with meetings for the rest of the day so it was now or never. Oliver called Diggle and asked him to bring the car around as soon as possible. Then the doorbell rang.

“Its okay Raisa. I got it,” Oliver bellowed.

“Hey buddy. So what do you want to today? Which club should we hit?”

“Tommy. What are you doing here?”

“Trying to figure out what my best friend wants to do today. Do you have anything in mind?”

“I actually have to go to QC today, and talk to Walter about something.”

“What?”

“Family stuff.”

“Will it take long?”

“No, but I have to go now or he’ll be in meetings the whole day. There’s my driver with the car now. Sorry.”

Oliver walked to the car and noticed that Tommy was following him.

“It’ll on be a few minutes.”

“Alright. I’m still coming with you. Then we can spend the rest of our time figuring out how we’re going to spend the weekend.”

The car drive was short, cause Dig was driving fast. He actually didn’t want Tommy to come, so he could talk to Dig about some Hood stuff, but Tommy was talking away-more than enough for the three of them.

“-This girl though. Man, she’s the easiest chick so far. I didn’t even have to talk to her, and she jumped on me. That was last year though, but I’m pretty sure she’d like to give you a warm welcome back if you know what I mean…”

                                                             ~

Oliver walked into QC with Tommy on his right side, and Dig slightly behind him on his left. He stepped out of the elevator, and walked into Walter’s office, Dig following him, and Tommy stayed behind.

“Oliver? What are you doing here?”

“I’m sorry Walter. I didn’t mean to interrupt your work but I need to talk to you about something important.”

“Its fine.” He looked at the woman across from his desk, and said “Miss Smoak, if you’d excuse us for a moment.”

Oliver looked around immediately. Felicity. She had helped him before with a few Hood related cases, but he hadn’t gotten around to telling her his secret-and he wouldn’t. She was hiding behind her glasses again. She had beautiful eyes, none like he had ever seen before. When they met his gaze electricity shot through his body. It was unusual but he liked it. Every other woman other than those related to him always looked at him with lust, but her eyes-they were so innocent and filled with understanding. She was wearing a periwinkle shirt, and black pants but her hair was out this time. It was long, and it suited her.

She stood up pretty quickly, and pushed her glasses up further up her nose after looking back at Walter.

“Of course Mr. Steele. We can finish this up-well you know. I’m just going to leave right now. So, I better get going you know-…” she trailed off, ducked her head and started to walk away.

“Just wait for me outside Miss Smoak. We can finish up right after this.”

She nodded.

Oliver caught her eye, and smiled at her before she passed Dig, and closed the door behind her.

“Mr. Diggle? Would you mind giving me a moment with my step-father?”

                                                         ~

When Oliver finished talking to Walter, they both stepped out of his office-and to Oliver’s dismay Tommy was flirting with Felicity.

“So, have you ever tried eating sushi off of someone’s body? I promise not to use chopsticks-”

“You’re still using that line,” Oliver interjected. “Don’t girls get tired of that?”

“No one gets tired of me Queen. Maybe you’re just losing your touch if that hasn’t been working for you.”

“I don’t use shitty pick up lines anymore Tommy.”

“I know you barely even talk to women anymore…which is fine by me if you’ve changed your mind, but I’m not sure how to be a wingman and get guys to crowd around you.”

Oliver rolled his eyes.

“Lucky for you, I don’t need a wingman for either.”

“What about you beautiful,” Tommy turned his attention back to Tommy. “Would you rather go out with him or me?”

“Umm…”

“I think thats enough,” Walter said. “Miss Smoak, I’d like to finish up the meeting now.”

“Yeah, of course, I just, yeah…” she got up and walked to his office, Walter closing the door behind them.

“Damn.”

“No Tommy.”

“You didn’t call dibs on her.”

“No Tommy.”

“I’m just messing around. I wouldn’t take her out.”

“Why not?”

“She’s girlfriend material not screwing material. I mean she could be both but, I’m pretty sure you’d need to be her boyfriend to screw her.”

“Don’t talk about screwing her. She’s sweet.”

“Are you sweet on her?”

“No, but I do like to respect people a little more now. I wouldn’t want to die an asshole a second time.”

Tommy finally shut up at that. So did Oliver a few seconds later. Thunder. Loud thunder in the sky, and lighting was emerging from behind the clouds.

                                                         ~

“Come on man lets go-”

The rest of Tommy’s words were drowned out by the loud thunder. Oliver was breathing heavily, and he was pretty sure his pupils were dilated. His heart was pounding so fiercely and he was back on the Gambit.

Sara. Sara was drowning, he couldn’t see her. The boat sank. They were on the safety boat. Bang. His father had pulled the trigger. His dad was dead against his lap. He made it to an island. He made it to Purgatory.

Oliver was looking around but his vision wasn’t clear. He could see a silhouette, which he made out to be Tommy a few seconds later. He could see his mouth forming words, but there was no sound. Oliver was walking back, and another silhouette was holding Tommy back. Dig.

Two more silhouettes appeared one of whom was Walter, and the other was by his side. Dig didn’t push this one away. He felt his back against the wall, he was probably crouching on the floor against it, trying to retreat, trying to escape purgatory. Then there was a hand on him. His first instinct was to throw it off, and kill the person but the hand was warm and soft and comforting. It wasn’t a threat, it was welcoming.

It took some time, but his vision cleared completely and then he saw them-those eyes, those beautiful innocent, understanding eyes. He looked into them a little longer, and felt his breath steady. She moved a little closer to him and he didn’t recoil.

“Oliver,” her voice was like a lullaby. It was so soothing and calm, and peaceful. Serenity. That’s the auroa that Felicity had around her. 

“Oliver? Can you hear me?”

He still couldn’t open his mouth but he somehow managed to nod his head.

“You’re okay. All of that terrible stuff that happened to you is done.”

He just listened to her voice, and knew that everything was good, so he continued to listen.

“You’re in the hallway outside of Mr. Steele’s office-at QC. He’s your step-father. You came here to talk to him, its okay. You’re back home, you’re safe.”

Thunder again. Loudly. Ferociously ringing in his ears, and he tightened again. So close.

“Hey, don’t do that. I know. I know that its scary, but be brave okay? Be brave. There’s no reason to be frightened right now. You’re at QC, not on…well you’re here and you’re safe. The only danger you’re in right now is listening to me babble. Other than that, you’re fine. No one is going to hurt you. Everyone wants you here, everyone wants to keep you safe. You’re fine. Do you believe me?”

“Yes,” he managed to choke out. “I believe you.” 

But why? Everyone else seemed like a threat to him, but not her. He felt safer around her, and they didn’t even know each other.

“Okay. Can you get up. I’ll help but you’re kind of heavy. Not heavy like fat heavy or like I have beer belly and donuts in my bloodstream heavy. No not at all. More like I have a 64 pack of abs of steel, and I meant like metal steel not like your step-father Walter Steele, that’d be weird. Not because he doesn’t have abs, or because he does, well I wouldn’t know because I work for him, and I don’t look at him like that. I don’t look at him at all actually, well I mean I do when he’s talking to me but that’s all eye contact because its polite and oh my god Felicity shut up!”

Oliver was laughing now. He-Oliver-pissed off-don’t let your guard down-Queen was laughing, and hard.

“It’s okay.”

“No its not. I’m going to be the first person to die because my mouth has gotten me into trouble. Its not like I have a bad mouth but it just doesn’t stop sometimes. It just keeps moving, everywhere. Oh no. When I said everywhere I meant the place setting not like on someone’s body, and oh please don’t fire me.”

“I wouldn’t fire you if I had the power to which I don’t, but I’ll put in a good word with Walter.”

He then turned to look up at Dig, Tommy, and Walter who were all watching the two of them.

“Walter, she keeps her job.”

He nodded, “I never intended on firing her. She’s one of the brightest minds at QC. She could be running this place one day.”

He walked passed them, and into his office.

“OH MY GOSH!”

“What?”

“He was behind me that whole time? He heard me? He probably hates me now.”

“You have a very weird understanding of the word hate then, because he just said you had one of the brightest minds at QC?”

“When?”

“Right now. Weren’t you listening?”

“No. I was kind of focused on your lips-NOT LIKE THAT…not not like that though. What I mean is that you speak differently to me and him. Its like you barely move your lips, like every word is forced-and I’m overstepping my boundaries again so I’m going to stop in 3…2…1…”

“No. Its fine. You’re very observant. No one else has picked up on that.”

She shrugged her shoulders and stood up. He was looking at her shoes now-what do you call those shoes that are boots but heels at the same time-whatever it was that’s what she was wearing. He looked up at her, and she had her arms out stretched-her hand held out to him.

He rolled his eyes, and managed to get up without it.“If I took your hand, you would’ve fallen right back on top of me.”

“And that’s bad-yeah no. That’s bad. Well its not good. Okay. So you’re okay now?”

“I think so. Thank you.”

“Yeah, okay , so yeah-bye.”

She turned away from him, and started to walk away. Back to the IT department he supposed. Tommy was near his side again.

“You good man?”

“Yeah-would you just. I gotta-”, and he was gone.

Felicity had already vanished through the elevators, and was probably a few floors down. 

When he finally got to the IT department he saw her sitting on her chair behind her desk engrossed in work. Loads of work.

He knocked. She looked up.

“Felicity? Do you have a minute?”

“Sure. What’s up? Another friend of yours do something illegal?”

“No, not yet. I just wanted to thank you.”

“Didn’t you already?”

“I don’t feel like thats enough. I was pretty out of it there, and you-you got me back into control.”

“That’s okay. It happens to all of us.”

He looked at her and tilted his head slightly. He was still smiling. It seemed that whenever Felicity Smoak was in his view he couldn’t wipe the smile off his face.

“Okay, well no it doesn’t. But it could. PTSD is a serious thing. You probably forgot to take your meds today right?”

“How do you know I have PTSD?”

“I don’t. Just well-I kind of assumed that you would considering everything thats happened to you. If I’m wrong, sorry, don’t-I mean I talk too much anyway and its none of my business-”

“You’re right. I do have PTSD. I’m on Zoloft. I woke up late, and forgot. So, its my fault.”

“Not taking the meds, yes it is, but what happened to you isn’t your fault.”

“What makes you think so?”

“Because you’re a good man.”

“You don’t even know me.”

“Exactly which is why you’re so good. I don’t normally judge people until I’ve known them for a while because they could be putting up a facade or something, but I don’t think that how it is with you. I think you’re really a good man, who is sorry for everything he’s done in the past. I think you hold yourself in contempt for every petty thing you’ve ever done in your life, and Oliver-you were so scared when the thunder struck. Its like you were back there again that night for the second time. No one deserves to be that scared or hurt. That’s something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.”

“You’re remarkable Felicity.”

She smiled.

“Thank you for remarking on it.”

“Anytime. Thanks for being my medicine today. If it weren’t for you I’d still be crouched against that wall outside of Walter’s office.”

“Anytime.”

He smiled.

“So, you probably have a lot of work to do.”

“A lot is a bit of an understatement.”

“So, I should probably go, and you should probably get back to your work.”

“Okay.”

Neither of them moved. More thunder. Dig and Tommy found them now.

“Hey bud. You ready to go?”

“Yeah.”

He didn’t move, but he did watch Felicity turn away from them, and her attention was back on her tablet. She flipped some hair of her shoulder, and picked up a pen. Red. Just like the first time he talked to her. More thunder.

“Felicity?”

She looked up.

“Do you mind if I stay here until the storm passes? I’ll let you work-its just.”

“Hey. I did say anytime, didn’t I?”

He pulled out the chair from the other side of her desk, and watched her work before Tommy cleared his throat.

“So…should I come back?”

“You can stay if you’d like, but just work on your pick up lines because they’re horrible, and that’s coming from a girl who can’t keep her mouth shut,” Felicity responded.

                                                   ~

Tommy was impressed. No one had ever shut him down before-other than Laurel. This girl was good for Ollie, and besides even though he tried to be subtle, and quietly talked to him and his bodyguard, Oliver was watching Felicity the whole time. And damn, he was smiling too. This girl was like medicine and happiness all in one.


End file.
